demons_duefandomcom-20200215-history
Valerin Caldwyre
from Characters General Overview Protagonist of the first chapter in the series, Rats in the Cellar, Valerin is a former member the Dernhem capitol City Guard turned Constable under the command Luther Vandermoor. She is headstrong, confident, compassionate, intelligent, and observant. Despite her young age (which is stated to be somewhere between 18 and 25), she is well-reasoned in combat through her years in The Guard. It is unknown why she has a surname, when basically the only people in Dernhem who have them are the ruling nobles. She normally wields a single-grip sword and shield combination, but in Rats in the Cellar, she wields a mace that he confiscated off a criminal she tracked to the inn. In Rats in the Cellar Valerin arrived at The Fair Harvest Inn chasing a criminal named Firgun Troye. She entered the inn without her weapons or armor so as to not invite trouble, but while inquiring about him, she unexpectedly encountered him when he tried to attack her. She punched him right in the jaw, knocking him out despite being caught off her guard. She was then approached by the inn's proprietor, Albert Fiskerne, who requests her to take a job for a him. Despite her misgivings about the man, she takes the job and calls her armor and an oil lantern. And rather than venturing back out to the stables to fetch her sword from her horse's saddle, she just takes the mace her initial quarry, Firgun, had with him. Now fully geared up, she ventures down into the darkness of Fair Harvest's cellar to find some clue of the missing girl's whereabouts. Rats picks up with her already in the middle of searching the labyrinthine halls and peering through a large hole that has been dug into the stone wall of the cellar with the claws of some great beast. The hole is large enough for a person to pass through. When Valerin moves on from the hole, small figures being to emerge from it, revealing she was being watched the whole time. In the dark beyond the light of her lantern's reach, the tiny creatures surround her quietly, waiting for their chance to strike, and they set a trap. As Valerin doubles back towards the exit of the cellar, she suddenly finds a discarded shoe lying out in the open she didn't see before. While she takes a closer look and inspects, her small assailants make their move by binding ropes around her booted ankles and then tripping her up. All too late, Valerin realizes that she was the hunted, not the hunter, all too late as she falls victim to this well-planned ambush as her attacks reveal themselves to be a horde of gremlins. Their ferocity, organized efforts, and skill at capturing much larger opponents following a tense between her and them leaves Valerin helplessly bound as their coordinated movements overwhelm and out-maneuver her at every turn. Soon, her arms are tied behind her back, her ankles are tied in a hobble, and ropes also ensnared her hair and nooses pull tight at her neck. With the bounty hunter completely helpless under their tiny knives, the gremlins begin their work. They begin stripping Valerin of her armor and gear, and finally - all of her clothing, except for her boots. Now naked and bound, Valerin is led away by the gremlins as they use a series of nooses to force her to walk through the dark halls of the cellar in embarrassed silence. But even in defeat and humiliation, Valerin is still a warrior with a soldier's instincts, and she strikes back with proficiency, and frees herself from her captors, beginning a chase through the falls of the cellar which takes her back to the stairwell leading to the inn proper. By the time Valerin reaches the stairs, however, the gremlins have caught up to her and stop her about halfway up by grabbing ahold of the trailing ropes again. She calls for help, and thankfully, the inn's owner comes to her aid, suddenly opening the door, letting bright light in the cellar, driving the gremlins away. He descends the steps with a knife in hand, seemingly to help her. Valerin's relief is short lived, however, because Albert then plops himself down right next to her and begins asking her a series of questions about her faith in the Lady of Light and Blade, the goddess the people of Dernhem worship. Confused and taken aback, Valerin answers that she is a believer, at which point Albert reveals his true colors as one of the conspirers behind her current predicament. She lunged for the knife Albert discarded on the stairs to free herself, but that turns out to be a diversion because while her back is to him, the innkeeper gags Valerin, silencing her. Feeling betrayed and enraged, Valerin fights back using the only things she has left: her feet which the gremlins generously left in her boots. She manages to bury the toe of one of her boots in his groin, and then while he's down, he lets him have in the face, putting him down. Now freed once again, Valerin turns and climbs the stairs to freedom and makes it into the small storage room between the cellar entrance and the main inn. But seconds before she can reach the door, the ropes go taut, snared on something else, and she yanked backwards towards the dark cellar again. Exhausted and more frightened than ever, Valerin turns to look at who or what's stopping her now, and it's against all odds, it's Albert, conscious and alive. He quickly subdues her and rolls her onto her stomach where he binds her hands and ankles together, completely immobilizing her. With his work finished, he picks the bounty hunter up and carries her on his shoulder as if she was a sack of potatoes back down, into the darkness... back to the horde of tiny fiends awaiting her, and the greater purpose that lies in store whether she wants any part of it, or not. In Twisted Plot Originally, Valerin did not reappear in the second chapter of the series, but upon the creation of fully revised versions of the early chapters, the author gave her a minor role. It's only just a few short asides to establish what became of her after being taken into the depths of the Undercellar. At the very beginning, it is established that Valerin was abducted to be forcefully converted into the conspiracy's ranks of followers, and apparently her cooperation is not a necessity at any stage. So she is tortured both physically and supernaturally, as well as humiliated at every turn until she gives in. However, her strong will gives her a resistance to the tortures not found in previous victims. The reason for this is a mystery to her captors, but it becomes a desirable trait to set the trend for all who will follow in her unfortunate path into the Undercellar. Imprisonment Valerin's abduction and unlawful incarceration has all the makings of an insane cult and a sadistic kidnapper. Aside from being forced to remain completely naked for the duration of her imprisonment, she was also shackled and silenced by an enchanted cleave gag that cannot be removed unless a magical command is given. She is also forced to sleep in a small cell more fit for a medium-sized animal rather than a human prisoner. The humiliatingly small den was build with the roof so low, there's only enough room for Valerin to lie down, sit and stand on her hands and knees while inside it. Deprived of even the most basic of bedding, like a straw pile, she is forced to sleep on the cold, stone floor. Truly caged like a thing owned. And the small, inhumanely small cell isn't where it ends, Valerin is frequently taken by a rope-leash around her neck by the gremlins and forced to crawl on all-fours around the underground labyrinth for their amusement. Her first appearance in "Twisted Plot" starts with such a session wherein she is forcefully roused from sleep by her gremlins captors and forced out for a 'walk.'